Google released some interesting data on hacked sites and their attempts to notify webmasters that their sites were compromised. They also released information on just how many sites are hacked – Google detected over 800,000 alone last year. Email Notifications This led to 75% of hacked sites being cleaned up when Google was able to […]
Which Manual Action Notice Does Google Send the Most?
Google has been sending out a wide variety of manual actions to webmasters for several years, ranging from invalid links to thin content warnings. But when it comes down to which manual action notice Google sends out to webmasters the most, the answer is somewhat surprising. Because the largest number of manual actions Google sends […]
Google Adds New HTTPS Transparency Report
Google has added a new section to their Transparency Report to cover how much traffic and how many sites are serving their sites via HTTPS and the results are pretty interesting. Today we are launching a new section of our Transparency Report to track the progress of encryption efforts—both at Google and on some of […]
WordPress Plugin Update Sent Admin Credentials & Installed Backdoor
Do you use a semi-popular WordPress plugin called Custom Content Type Manager (CCTM)? If so, you will want to stop everything and change ALL your user passwords, roll back (or use the latest release) of CCTM, as well as patch a list of files compromised thanks to the new plugin user who installed a backdoor and […]
When Switching to HTTPS, Google Recrawls Faster to Process Move
John Mueller recently posted a Q&A for moving a site from HTTP to HTTPS. He has answered several questions readers had, and one of them was noteworthy for those who are making the switch to a secure site. When Google recognizes that a site is switching to HTTPS, Google will sometimes recrawl the site faster […]
Google’s Safe Browsing Will Now Block Deceptive Ads
Have you ever needed to download a file from a download site, only to play a virtual game of hide and seek of “which is the real download button and not the one that will install shady malware if I click the wrong one?” Or those “your flash player requires an update” ads? Google has […]
Update WordPress Immediately; Major Vulnerability Fixes
If you haven’t already updated WordPress with yesterday’s update, you will want to update immediately. It fixes several vulnerabilities, including critical ones that are out in the wild. Shortly before the update was released, Sucuri released information regarding a major exploit they were seeing across many WordPress sites that resulted in many WordPress sites infected […]
Don’t Have to Move All Pages to HTTPS; Can Move Partial Sites
Many people are a bit wary of switching to HTTPS, especially with the potential loss of rankings while Google recrawls and matches up HTTP URLs with the new HTTPS ones. While Google has said this shouldn’t take more than a couple of weeks, many site owners are still a bit concerned over the potential for […]
No PageRank Loss When 301 or 302 Redirect to HTTPS
One of the concerns that people have had over switching to HTTPS is whether there would be any PageRank loss, even a small amount, by redirecting all pages from the HTTP version to the HTTPS version. After all, no one wants to make the switch for the tiny ranking boost (which acts as more of […]
Google Search Console Alerts for Outdated WordPress & Joomla Sites
Google Search Console sent out another round of alerts to both WordPress users and Joomla users where they discovered that the site is running an older version of the CMS. Here is what the alert looks like. It gives sample URLs which is helpful if you have multiple installations of a CMS on a single […]